The cop of the future: Will crooks have a chance against smart bullets, crowd-stun cannons and eyes everywhere?

By Joshua Rhett Miller

Courtesy: Accenture

Criminals may not have a chance in 2025, when the cop of the future will be an imposing crime-fighting machine, able to see around corners in urban environments, identify suspects at a glance, safely pursue stolen cars and effortlessly bring unruly crowds under control.

Police departments around the country are already testing technologies like Google Glass, lapel cameras and tracking devices that allow safer pursuit of fleeing suspects. But this is merely a glimpse of what’s to come, according to experts contacted by FoxNews.com. They said increasing reliance on data mining, predictive analysis and all manner of gadgets will make getting away with crime harder than ever.

“The emergence of new technologies will have significant impact on how front-line police services are delivered in the years ahead and how police officers will look and perform their duties in the future,” Ger Daly, global managing director of Accenture Defense and Public Safety, told FoxNews.com. “All forces endeavor to provide high levels of situational awareness to front-line officers, and technology is a key enabler of this.”

'All forces endeavor to provide high levels of situational awareness to front-line officers, and tech is a key enabler.'

- Ger Daly, global managing director, Accenture Defense and Public Safety

One of the key aspects of the “digital revolution” already under way in the form of ongoing trials at police departments in Los Angeles, London and Byron, Ga., is the use of body cameras. These lightweight devices offer increased accountability for officers and departments alike, providing real-time video evidence of interactions with the public. In the future, technologies like lapel cameras and Google Glass may allow officers and emergency responders to access live information feeds as they engage or pursue suspects on city streets or inside buildings.

“The camera within the device could potentially capture the facial images of persons of interest or suspects and run these images against databases of known felons, repeat offenders, wanted or missing persons,” Daly told FoxNews.com.

LAPD Police Chief Charlie Beck has said the addition of lapel cameras — currently being tested in the field for a three-month period — will aid investigators and provide an additional degree of accountability. The LAPD then plans to purchase 600 cameras this summer for officers with more than $1 million in private donations. The department has also already equipped 300 of its 1,200 patrol cars with video recorders, according to The Associated Press, a longtime goal since the 1991 beating of Rodney King.

Another key concept of the near-future cop will be mobility and the ability to respond to emergencies with decreasing resources, according to “American Policing in 2022: Essays on the Future of a Profession,” a Department of Justice collection of ideas on the next decade of law enforcement.

“In 2012, troopers are beginning to utilize mobile applications such as electronic traffic citations and traffic crash reports,” Michigan State Police Director Col. Kriste Kibbey Etue wrote. “By 2022, troopers will have a one-stop shop records management system that will incorporate all common administrative needs, including time accounting, report writing, form completion and data collection. Troopers will also have direct access to sophisticated biometric information that will make hiding one’s identity nearly impossible.”

Biometrics — or identification based on unique physical or behavioral characteristics — has long been used to identify terrorists, wanted criminals, sex offenders and immigration violators at airports and ports of entry around the world, but many in law enforcement circles expect the technology to explode in coming years. Balancing public safety versus privacy implications becomes the next key question, experts told FoxNews.com.

“The potential is there to have it become pretty Draconian if we choose to go that route,” said John Roman, senior fellow at The Urban Institute, a Washington-based think tank.

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